President-elect Trump’s “America first” policy may hamper EV trade

The expanding momentum of the US EV market which recently crossed the milestone of selling more than a million EVs may get disrupted after the Trump administration’s policy changes, CBT news reported.

As the EV prices continue to drop while competing with the ICE counterparts, the "America First" policy of Donald Trump will impose high import duties which may invite repercussions. 

When he assumed office on January 20, President-elect Donald Trump promised to sign an executive order imposing a broad 25% tariff on all goods imported from Canada and Mexico. The update may hamper the import of steel, which originates in nations like Canada and Mexico and is essential for constructing solar farms, wind turbines, and other renewable energy infrastructure, frequently. U.S. businesses may have to pay an extra $1.1 billion to $4.2 billion for steel as a result of tariffs.

The plan, which Trump unveiled on Monday on his social media site Truth Social, has the potential to harm the U.S. EV sector and disrupt international trade, a report by InsideEVs stated.

With 75% of the world's battery cells and 85% of its anodes produced, China is the market leader in batteries worldwide. Proposed tariffs may more than quadruple the cost of lithium-ion batteries, which U.S. companies imported from China for $4 billion in 2022. 

The U.S. is the biggest importer of EVs, with $44 billion in imports last year, thus the market for EVs would also be negatively impacted. Trump's planned tariffs, which would mostly affect cars from Mexico, which exports EVs manufactured by Ford and GM, may raise the price of EVs by $4.4 billion to $8.8 billion, depending on the duty rate.